Schrodinger's Bookshelf

Home - Page 45 << 1 2 … 43 44 45 46 47 … 120 121 >>

Seven Nations, The Coffee Pot, Roanoke, Virginia, USA (October 27, 2003)

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

It could only have been serendipity at work. I only found out that Seven Nations was performing near me less than six hours before the show. If I hadn’t been listening to the radio, I wouldn’t even have been -that- lucky. As it was, I cleared my schedule in a hurry, and hithered away to the Coffee Pot, one of Roanoke’s quirkier and cooler music spots, best known for the giant coffeepot decoration that stands outside. I’ve been in Roanoke for seven years now and this is the first time I’ve ever actually been to the Coffee Pot, but I suspect I’ll go back often.

Rather than try to re-encapsulate the history and success of Seven Nations, I’ll point you to our previous reviews (The Factory and Seven Nations), and their own site. I’m not going anywhere. Go on, read. Familiarize yourself. Embrace the unusual blend of Celtic, rock, pop, thrash, traditional, and eclectic that is Seven Nations. Comprehend that these guys are the real thing, a quintet of hard-playing, hard-traveling musicians who can rock the house, whether it’s a crowd of 15, or 15,000. Dig it? I was already a fan, based on their previous albums. I wasn’t about to pass up a chance to see them play in my hometown.

The evening started on a slow note, with a warmup act dredged from one of the local radio stations. Unfortunately, I can only wonder who this performer had naked pictures of, for as warmup acts go, he was…lukewarm. Though technically competent with the acoustic guitar, his vocal skills were enthusiastic but anguished, tormenting songs such as “Last Dance With Mary Jane,” and “Whiskey In The Jar” (as done by Metallica). My friends and I were torn between applauding to celebrate when he was done, and not applauding in the fear that it might encourage him. Note that he remains nameless. This is on purpose.

Though the show was scheduled to start at 8 pm, it wasn’t until 9 that Seven Nations, five men strong, took the stage in all their glory. That was the last time for several hours that I was able to stay still. They immediately launched into an energetic number, which so capivated me I completely forgot to note which one it was. All I remember now is that it caught my attention, and didn’t give it back. Following a brief debate on whether the band had ever actually been to Roanoke before (nope), they segued into “The Factory Song,” the title track from The Factory, which invoked my FHL (Faster, Harder, Louder) quotient for the first, but certainly not the last, time of the night. I couldn’t keep my foot from tapping, or my head from bobbing.

To slow things down a little, they then did “This Season,” also from The Factory (As they explained, they’d be doing a bunch from that particular album; it’s the only one they had left to sell, after selling out of the rest in Richmond and L.A.). In between numbers, they happily joked around with the audience, talking about their rough schedule and showing some feigned confusion as to what day it was. After that, they threw themselves into a traditional set, described only as “3 slip-jigs and a reel” and believe me, they didn’t hold back. I was convinced that fiddler Dan Stacey’s fingers would fall off, or his fiddle would catch on fire, the way he was going. Happily, neither of those occured.

Notable quote of the evening: “Don’t be the Freebird Guy.” This, naturally, came about because when they started asking what they should play, there was the inevitable call of “Freebird,” which naturally invoked the question of what said song would sound like if done with bagpipes. Thank goodness, they didn’t try it. Instead, we were treated to “The Big Yellow Bus,” a balladesque tune inspired by John Lennon’s death. Then, for some strange reason, the group started swapping cat anecdotes… Clearly, they were having as much fun as the audience, and loving every minute, and the mood was contagious.

Perhaps fearing reprisals for what they were about to do, four of the five fled the stage, leaving the incomparable Scott Long to perform a bagpipe solo that was hypnotic both in its discordance and in its creativity. Even now, the memory fades, leaving me only with the knowledge that I experienced something rare and beautiful. I bow down to the Bagpipe Gods.

Then there was the Macarena Incident. In a true fit of whimsy, the band decided to try and play the Macarena…this incident is never to be spoken of again. It was just too surreal. However, making up for it was the brilliant fiddle solo by Dan Stacey, accompanied in the latter half by drummer Crisco, who contributes heavily to the overall energy and sheer power of Seven Nations. And as the rest of the group returned from taking a brief break, they kicked up the FHL level to the degree needed to get Dan to step-dance. My god, if I wasn’t straight….er, anyway, it was simply fantastic. They wound down with a slow number, but were convinced to come back on stage for an encore, for which they did “Waiting For Midnight” from their latest album And now it’s come to this.

Though I’ve primarily talked about Dan, Crisco, and Scott, I’d be lax if I didn’t mention Struby (acoustic and electric bass guitar and heavy rhythm), and Kirk McLead (lead singer, songwriter, guitarist, and driving force), for it’s only through the collective efforts of all five that the show was such an awesome experience. I went in expecting a good show, and my expectations were simply blown away by the sheer energy and talent of Seven Nations. I don’t think I stopped moving, whether it was toe-tapping, head-bobbing, or outright clapping and hollering, the entire time they were on stage, and I wasn’t alone in my enthusiastic response. The crowd loved these guys with a passion. The Coffee Pot’s not a large venue; maybe a hundred people all told were there (though I’m bad at guesstimating these things) and it was fairly well packed.

All in all, if I’d missed this show, I would have kicked myself severely, and I’m glad I caught it. Seven Nations is on the road a -lot-, so check their site to see if they’re coming your way. You won’t regret it.

Another Fairy Tale Omnibus Review

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

The Faeries, by Suza Scalora (Joanna Cotler Books/Harpercollins, 1999)
The Faeryland Companion, by Beatrice Phillpotts (Barnes and Noble, 1999)
The Leprechaun Companion, by Niall Macnamara with Wayne Anderson (Barnes and Noble, 1999)
Gnomes, by Wil Huygen and Rien Poortvliet (Peacock Press/Bantam Books, 1979)
The Kingdom of the Dwarves, by Robb Walsh and David Wenzel (Centaur Books, 1980)
The Hobbit Companion, by David Day with Lidia Postman (Turner Publishing, 1997)
The Great Encyclopedia of Faeries, by Pierre Dubois with Claudine and Roland Sabatier (Simon and Schuster, 1999)
The Fairies’ Ring, by Jane Yolen with Stephen Mackey (Dutton Childrens’ Books, 1999)

“I have gone out and seen the lands of Faery,
    And have found sorrow and peace and beauty there,
And have not known one from the other, but found each
    Lovely and gracious alike, delicate and fair.”
        -“Dreams within Dreams” by Fiona Macleod

Open your eyes to the world around you. There are things, there, living and hiding often in plain sight. We know them by many names: The Fair Folk, fairies, gnomes, goblins, dwarves, brownies, elves, tommyknockers… the list is endless, with as many names for the creatures of fancy and myth as there are people to dream of them and tell their stories. Are they real, or just figments of our imaginations, created to pass the time and explain away mysteries in a much more superstitious era? That, I must say, is up to you to decide. But gathered for your entertainment and approval are a handful of coffee table books, art books full of paintings, photography, stories, poems, and even scholarly analysis of the hidden world.

First up is an absolutely gorgeous little book, The Fairies, by Suza Scalora. Detailed as “Photographic Evidence of the Existence of Another World,” it’s certainly easy to conclude from the photos within that fairies really do exist. Presented with a playful sort of seriousness, it lays out each of the twenty-six entries, or “plates” in the same fashion.   On the left page is the entry for the fairy in question, detailing their common name, other known names, the date and location of the particular sighting, and the season in which said fairy is most likely to be seen. Following that is a short history of the creature, the particular lure used to bring it out into the open, and finally notes on the specific encounter.    On the right is a full-color glossy photograph of the fairy in its natural environment

Now, these aren’t your traditional fairies, the ones well-recorded throughout history. These sport names like Ophelia, the Pearl-White Fairy, or Willow, the Silver Leaf Fairy. They lurk in the woods of Georgia, a glacier in the Icelandic highlands, the lush valleys of Peru, Hawaii, or even the Neolithic goddess temples of Malta. They embody fire and ice, air and sky, birds and trees. Each one is unique and fantastical, playful and whimsical and capricious. They can be lured by pencils, bright balloons, fireflies, salt, or even just simple trespass into their domains. And they are elusive.

Of all of the books I’ve seen in putting this review together, The Fairies may be the most beautiful from an artistic standpoint. The conscious mind may be secure knowing that the photos are all cleverly-doctored, involving humans in costume and makeup, but the child-like, magic-seeking part of me wanted to believe, if even for just a moment. More than anything, this book captures the sheer alien nature of the fairies, the way they can be seen out of the corner of your eye, when the light and mood is just so. I was initially attracted by the artistic value of this book, and I’m quite pleased by it.

While we’re on the subject of fairies, we’ll move along to Beatrice Phillpotts’ The Faeryland Companion. This one seeks to be a more comprehensive look at fairies in history, art, and literature, starting with a look at fairies in their natural environments and ending with their role in art.

This is quite the informative book, really. The very first entry lists over half a dozen different theories on the origins of the Fair Folk, from unforgiven souls to diminished pagan dieties. It looks at the places they’re most commonly associated with: underground kingdoms, enchanted forests, even somewhere out in the ocean. It examines them as tiny creatures and hulking giants, as creatures of enchantment and beings of mystery. It details all of the customs traditionally associated with them, such as fairy rades or household assistance, or music and dance. There’s a section that tells about fairies and their interactions with humans, both benevolent and malevolent, from fairy godmothers to changeling children and even the time differential between their world and ours. Finally, the section on art touches upon the Victorian fascination with fairies, the incident involving supposed photographic proof of fairies (which fooled just about everyone), and then ends with a look at that modern master himself, Brian Froud.

The Faeryland Companion is a well-constructed book, worth checking out for its wealth of lore and art, collected from many different sources. While it doesn’t have the in-depth examination that some works might, it balances out information and accessability, and still comes out looking quite pretty. It looks at them with a historical and popular sort of view, drawing in bits of poetry, Shakespearian quotes, Froud artwork, and more. Definately a nice effort that doesn’t disappoint.

In that same vein, also released as a Barnes and Noble exclusive is The Leprechaun Companion by Niall Macnamara, illustrated by Wayne Anderson. It does for leprechauns what Brian Froud’s Faeries did for, well, fairies. However, this has a much more Celticentric angle to it, looking at the indiginous fairyland creatures which inhabit that part of the world. It seeks to tell the truth of leprechauns, that they’re not always as cheerful as one might suppose; that indeed they can be quite cantanerous and capricious. It has details on how to look for leprechauns, and also how to avoid them. Though they go by many different names, from clurichauns to luchrymen, the book lumps them as leprechauns for ease of clarity. We go into the details of their society: food, work, courtship, dwellings, drink, even fashion. We learn how to bottle them, and why it’s not always smart. We learn about their holidays, games, music, and of course, magic.

Once we have the basics out of the way, the book happily goes into the details of the various leprechaun clans, which roughly divide themselves between the provinces of Ireland: Leinster, Munster, Ulster, and Connaught, ultimately overseen by the Sidhe, the kinglike race of the fairies descended from the primeval Tuatha de Danaan. Each clan has its own defining characteristics and natures, as well as associated legends and tales.

In the last chapter, we’re introduced to a host of leprechaun cousins, a motley assortment of Celtic creatures from myth and legend. Merpeople, fir dearg, phouka (like our old friend from War For The Oaks!), brownies, redcaps, bwca, piskies, spriggans, and more. Each one has a short description of nature and history, as well as an associated tale to accompany it.

This is a very nice book. The artwork is appropriately stylized and whimsical, taking a more humorous, old-fashioned view of the creatures in question, slightly cartoonish without losing their dignity. It’s nowhere near as evocative as Froud’s, but it certainly does the job quite well. If you like Celtic myth and fairy tales, this book might be worth checking out.

Since we’ve gotten onto the topic of scholarly volumes regarding creatures of myth, it’s only natural to skip next to Gnomes, a 1979 release from Wil Huygen and Rien Poortvliet which really did set the stage for many of these other books. It has a distinctly European feel and bias to it, looking at the world of the woodland gnomes of Europe, Russia, and Siberia, but also branching out to discuss other related beings.

Where to begin? Quite simply, this book lays it all out in its multitudinous entries, from history and legends to their very physiology and medicine. To detail it would be an exercise in futility, as it’s crammed full of sketches, drawings, paintings, essays, tales, speculation and examination. Open to a random page, and read about their breakfast. Another page has a drawing of a gnome skeleton. There’s a look at their digestive system, for example, and maps showing population density across Europe and North America. The list goes on.

I adore this book. Very few can come close to it in terms of constructing a full-fledged, believable society for mythical creatures, and present it in such a charming, accessible, artistic package. The associated art ranges from serious to whimsical, and never loses track of the fey qualities of the gnomes within. (But what’s up with those pointed red hats? I think there’s a section devoted to that question…) If you like Froud’s Faeries, this book is essential for your collection.

Lest no underground-dwelling creature of myth be left out, next on the list is Kingdom of the Dwarves, by Robb Walsh and illustrated by David Wenzel. Released in 1980, it presents itself as an archaeological and sociological study of the mythical dwarves as they lived and thrived over 1500 years ago. Again, it draws upon popular myth and legend to weave something greater, building upon the fairy tales of old to postulate the dwarves as an entire race of their own. It shows how they could have built an empire underground, and where they came from before then. It links them to any number of stories passed down to our time, including Stonehenge and Camelot.

The strengths of this book lie in the sharp, fully-realized drawings and occasional colored painting that scatter throughout, illustrating the various aspects of the dwarves’ lives. However, a goodly number of retold legends and stories about the dwarves to further expand upon what we know or think we know also make it an entertaining read.

Kingdom of the Dwarves is interesting, even beautiful in its own right. Postulating them as a highly advanced race which influenced our own development before falling to a catastrophic plague before fleeing or dying is certainly an interesting choice, but no harder to swallow than any of the other theories regarding mythic creatures (such as the one where they’re a third aspect of angels who refused to takes sides and so were cast down to Earth). It’s quirky, and worth checking out if you can track down a copy.

Our next stop as we look at mythic races is a Tolkien-influenced book, The Hobbit Companion, written by David Day and illustrated by Lidia Postman. By now, I’m sure it’s a bit redundant to say that this book is inspired by those odd hairy-footed creatures of comfort that play such a big role in The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. It draws extensively from Tolkien’s many and thorough writings on the history and societies of Middle-Earth, and as far as I can tell, it does a very satisfactory job of making it accessible and welcoming for new and old readers alike. That is, if they like literary games and clever language analysis.

As the book says, it’s “an exploration of the inspirational power of language. It proposes that the entire body of Tolkein’s writing dealing with Hobbits was essentially the product of a list of asssociations with the word Hobbit. Thus, the invention of the word Hobbit resulted in the creation of the character, race, and world of the Hobbit.” That sounds pretty serious to me. Clearly, this book aspires to go above and beyond the call of duty in taking us on a tour of the world of the Hobbit. It certainly takes some interesting side-trips. For instance, the fact that “hobbit” appears right after “hoax” in many dictionaries is significant and worthy of analysis; that the entire Hobbit is presented as a literary hoax rather than a true novel.

There’s an extensive study of the name Bilbo Baggins, and how it relates to the nature of the character and his role in Hobbit society and in the book itself. I never knew you could read so much in to one name. The analysis of Gollum’s name in relationship to goblins, hobbits, hobgoblins, and more is just… uncanny. And it only gets more interesting and convoluted from there as it studies the Shire, Bag End, The Tooks and the Brandybucks, Gandalf, trolls, giants, dragons, rings, thieves, the Fellowship and Frodo. All the while picking apart words and phrases and names, looking for hidden meaning and strange relations that I never would have thought extant. Just as Tolkein was a true scholar of linguistics, so does David Day tease apart the strands of Middle-Earth to spiritedly explain what it all might possibly mean.

This is an amazing book, dizzying in its complexity, but astounding in the way it offers up the information and presents it to be studied, digested, and possibly even understood. While it looks like a rather generic Tolkein-inspired book at first, it swiftly establishes and maintains its own unique identity. This is one for the scholars, trivia experts, and those who love working with words.

Having conducted a tour of the other races, we now circle back around to the beginning, with The Great Encyclopedia of Faeries, written by Pierre Dubois, and illustrated by Claudine and Roland Sabatier. My goodness. This one is really serious about its business, coming across as a weighty tome chuck-full of fairy goodness. Seriously, it collects a whole (shining) host of myths, legends, lore, fairy tales and the like from all across the world to give us a rather thorough collection of fairy-related information.

The sections are broken up into “Maidens of Clouds and of Time,” “The Faeries of the Hearth,” “The Golden Queens of the Middle World,” “The Faeries of Rivers and the Sea,” “The Maidens of the Green Kingdom,” and “The Ethereal Ones of Infinite Dreams.” Despite the somewhat flowery nature of these chapter titles, the actual material contained within each chapter is serious, and far-reaching, looking at fairies on a global level. For instance, that first chapter includes the Valkryies, Mother Holle, genies and assorted thunder gods, and even Saint Lucia, Cinderella, and the Sleeping Beauties. Faeries of the Hearth include Melusine and assorted countryside dragons. I’d even go so far as to say that the majority of the fairies and creatures spotlighted in this book are more obscure, lesser-known, and Eurocentric. The entries vary in tone and aspect from creature to creature; each one is detailed with stories and tales, while sidebars contain the bare facts like size, appearance, dress, food, habitat, custom and activities.

Combining this more in-depth look at lesser-known legends and fairy creatures with some stylish, absolutely beautiful artwork, The Great Encyclopedia of Faeries manages to live up to the high ideals set forth by its name. It has enough new or obscure information, and presents it in such an approachable manner, that it’s sure to be a welcome addition to any reference section or bookshelf.

Finally, we end our tour with a collection brought together and adapted by one of Green Man’s favorite experts, Jane Yolen, who gives us The Fairies’ Ring: A Book of Fairy Stories and Poems. She’s joined in this by illustrator Stephen Mackey. Unlike the other books in this review, The Fairies’ Ring is a collection of poetry and stories about the Fae, as opposed to a concordance or encyclopedia. Yolen has brought together both old and new in an effort to best present the full range and scope of the fairies’ nature.

There’s a prose retelling of Thomas the Rhymer, always one of my favorite myths, and a selection from Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream. There’s works by William Cory (Catching Fairies), Ben Jonson (Queen Mab), Sir Walter Scott (Fairy Song), W.B. Yeats (The Stolen Child), and several from Yolen herself (The Queen of the Fay, and Where To Find Fairies). Over two dozen in all, ranging from England to Persia, from Scotland to France, from Greece to New Zealand, from Wales to Africa, representing numerous cultures. In some cases, the story remains intact; in others, Yolen has adapted existing tales to better present the proper atmosphere and feel for the fairies.

In every case, Mackey gives us some drop-dead artwork, which captures the feyness of the fairies, injects an ethereal tone into the people, and invokes something rich and wild all the way through. It’s easy to pick out the Faerie Queen in one of his paintings; she’s unmistakable. Landscapes are mysterious, holding that air of enigma and challenge, so that one might truly believe the fairies live just under the hill or around the corner. These paintings are lush, soft in a Victorian manner, romantic without being sensitive. And they tell the story.

Finally, a short essay on source notes explains where each of these stories came from, or where Yolen found her inspiration. It’s very helpful, especially as a springboard towards finding out more.

And that concludes our tour for the time being… make sure you don’t get lost on the way home.

“I have come back from the hidden, silent lands of Faery
    And have forgotten the music of its ancient streams:
And now flame and wind and the long, grey, wandering wave
    And beauty and peace and sorrow are dreams within dreams.”
                – “Dreams Within Dreams” by Fiona Macleod

The Taltos Series, by Steven Brust (1983-2001)

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

Jhereg (Ace, 1983)
Yendi (Ace, 1984)
Teckla (Ace, 1987)
(These three reprinted in The Book of Jhereg (Ace, 1999))
Taltos (Ace, 1988)
Phoenix (Ace, 1990)
(These two reprinted in The Book of Taltos (Ace, 2002)
Athyra (Ace, 1993)
Orca (Ace, 1996)
Dragon (Tor, 1998)
Issola (Tor, 2001)
Jhereg: The Graphic Novel (Epic Comics, 1990)

Vlad Taltos is a very dangerous man. He has to be, in his line of work. He’s an assassin. He’s an Easterner (what we’d call human) in an empire full of near-immortal, very powerful beings known collectively as the Dragaerians. They have magic, superior numbers, and lifespans that allow them to plan over the course of centuries. They’re faster, taller, stronger, meaner, and possessed of Byzantine codes of honor and traditions that stretch back hundreds of thousands of years. He’s an upstart, daring to play and beat them at their own game.

Long ago, Vlad’s father spent all he had to buy a title within one of the seventeen great Houses of the Empire, becoming part of the Jhereg. These are the assassins, the criminals, the shady dealmakers, what the Mafia could be if given a few millennia to prosper and plan. Vlad’s father thought he was setting his son up for a good life. He was wrong.

Neither fish nor fowl, Easterner nor Dragaerian, holding a title within a noble House but caring nothing for it, Vlad was forced to develop amazing survival skills. And that’s how it all began.

He’s a witch, having mastered some of the arcane powers only Easterners may truly understand. He’s a sorcerer, having learned many of the psychic and magical talents shared by the Dragaerians. He’s got one of the flying lizardlike creatures also known as jhereg as his familiar. He’s going to need all the help he can get, for Vlad Taltos is the sort of man who makes enemies quicker than he can kill them. And this, collectively, is his story.

Over the course of ten volumes now, Steven Brust has charted the career of Vlad Taltos, skipping back and forth out of sequence to give us his beginnings, his endings, his rise and fall within the Jhereg organization. We’ve followed his progress through life and death, war and peace, prosperity and exile. And we’ve truly grown to know this extraordinary man, in his own words, through his own voice.

Jhereg introduces us to Vlad in the prime of his career, already well-established as an assassin and Jhereg businessman, responsible for the illegal and shady dealings in his small area of the great city of Adrilankha.

He’s got a steady business, a network of associates, and a few trusted friends, as well as his beautiful wife Cawti, an Easterner like himself who once killed him. (Hey, love is rough.) We’re dropped into his life, just as things begin to get … messy. It seems a certain important Jhereg by the name of Mellar has absconded with a little bit of money. Like, say, the lion’s share of the House’s funds, to the tune of nine million gold. The Jhereg council wants him very dead, very discreetly, before anyone else can get any funny ideas about robbing from them and surviving. Vlad gets tapped for the job with an offer he just can’t refuse and can’t even talk about.

So Vlad gathers the troops. His trusted lieutenant Kragar, the eccentric psychic Daymar, the legendary Kiera the Thief, and his own loving wife, Cawti. In no time at all, they’ve found the missing Mellar. One small problem. He’s residing at the Castle Black.

Which is the stronghold of the Dragonlord Morrolan, an extremely powerful man in his own right, one of Vlad’s closest friends, and someone who takes a promise of sanctuary very, very seriously. In short, Vlad can’t touch Mellar without sparking another Dragon-Jhereg War. Which would be bad. Very bad.

As Vlad and his allies try to lure Mellar out of his hiding spot in a manner which won’t offend Morrolan, they realize that the plot thickens. Assassins lurk and death is on everyone’s mind as the full extent of Mellar’s plotting and treachery comes to light.

If he dies, it’ll destroy no less than three of the Great Houses. If he lives, the Dragons and Jheregs will inevitably war anyway.

And Vlad’s own life hangs in the balance if he mucks this one up. It’ll take an obscene amount of cunning and split-second timing to bring down Mellar before things go wrong, and even then, help will be needed from the most unexpected quarters.

Yendi takes place before Jhereg. When Vlad goes to investigate a new gambling den that’s been opened in his territory without his permission, he discovers it’s more than a direct challenge, it’s the prelude to all-out territorial war — an expensive, messy, violent, bad-for-business war. The sort of war that gets one killed. Luckily, death isn’t always an absolute in the Dragaerian Empire; in fact, it’s downright common. As long as certain parts of the body and soul remain intact, that is. Thus, we’re introduced to Cawti, the deadly Dagger of the Jhereg, assassin extraordinaire. Once both Vlad and Cawti have paid their respects to the Land of the Dead and been revivified, they find that careers notwithstanding, it’s love (and lust) at first sight. (The couple that slays together, stays together?)

Ultimately, it becomes a question of who benefits from a Jhereg turf war. The answer? Someone with a lot of time to kill, and a rather devious mind. Dragaerian politics run rough and convoluted in the Empire. Unraveling this particular plot will be a true challenge for Vlad, Morrolan, Cawti, and their friends, including the undead sorceress Sethra Lavode, and the feisty Dragonlord, Aliera. But will they solve it before Vlad’s business goes up in flames?

Teckla bounces us to a time period right after the events of Jhereg. A now rich Vlad is thinking of expanding his territory. Cawti is thinking about the rights of Easterners in Adrilankha. Revolution, conspiracy, treachery, assassination and betrayal are all part of the everyday routine for the two lovers as they struggle to maintain their marriage in the face of some truly profound changes in the world around them. Will Vlad stick to his Jhereg loyalties, or seek solidarity with his own people and his wife? Will he join the revolution, or destroy it? And when members of the Eastern group start dying, what will he do to avenge them? It’s mayhem and magic and murder in the way only Vlad Taltos can deliver. It’s an all-out struggle between the classes, and anyone caught in the middle is bound to regret it. Especially our hero, when it comes time to choose sides.

Before we can find out how the revolution turns out, Brust takes us back in time again, to the beginning of Vlad’s career, in Taltos. This is how it all began, folks. How Vlad became an assassin. How he met the enigmatic Morrolan, lord of the flying Castle Black. How he first met the ancient sorceress Sethra Lavode, mistress of Dzur Mountain. How Vlad obtained the mystical gold chain known as Spellbreaker. How he first met the best thief in the world, Kiera. How he first visited the Lands of the Dead in order to return someone very important to life, as opposed to killing them. In all regards, this is the origin story of our hero, explaining a great many mysteries laid out in the first few books, and establishing the hows and whys of his relationships with a very peculiar trio of Dragaerians: Sethra Lavode, Morrolan, and Aliera.

Then it’s on to Phoenix to pick up on Vlad and Cawti’s story. He’s just acquired a very large amount of the city as his territory. She’s still on that revolution and change kick. It’s getting pretty awkward for the two, and their friends. Luckily, Vlad gets a job. Someone needs someone else killed, and he’s perfect for the job. Two problems. The target is the king of an island nation called Greenaere. Vlad’s employer is the Demon Goddess Verra. This is one job he most definitely can’t turn down. Worse, he’ll be going into it without his full magical strength, thanks to some special properties of Greenaere. All in a day’s work, right?

You guessed it. Nothing is ever simple with Vlad’s life. Killing the king is easy, escaping from prison hard. Getting home is a simple matter, with the right friends. Having his wife released from jail after a small misunderstanding involving the revolutionary organization is extremely hard. Stopping the war that breaks out between the Empire, Greenaere, and Elde Island … well, Vlad’s had better days.

The Empire itself threatens to crumble as pressure builds from within and without, and Adrilankha looks ready to sink into chaos and confusion and rioting. Vlad will have to make the most important choice of his life, between life and love, honor and loyalty, Easterners and Jhereg. If he follows one path, he will die. If he follows another, he’ll lose Cawti forever; a third, and the Jhereg themselves will be after him, for they don’t take betrayal lightly. Vlad, Baronet of Taltos, assassin and businessman, witch and sorcerer, will gain everything he’s always wanted … and then what?

Athyra continues the story of Vlad Taltos as he heads for the hills and into retirement, only to find himself swept up in yet another conspiracy. A few murders, some convoluted plotting, and of course the nastiest people the Jhereg could find, out for his head, any way they can get it. Even as Vlad finds himself with Savn, a young man in need of some training, he realizes that his past can’t be escaped so easily.

Vlad always pays his debts. And in Orca he’s up to his eyeballs in repaying them. There’s the matter of the brain-damaged young man who suffered said damage in saving Vlad’s life in the previous book. There’s a wise woman who can help said young man, if Vlad will just do something about the bank foreclosing on her house. And there’s a multilayered paper trail of fake organizations, false names, imaginary companies, and one very dead member of the House of the Orca. The financial fate of the Empire rests upon Vlad’s ability to solve the mystery before it all collapses and throws the Empire into ruin. It’s a shaky house of cards, with Vlad as the man who could topple it all, or save it all. If the Jhereg don’t find him first. Luckily, he has the aid of Kiera the Thief, whose own secrets threaten to shatter everything Vlad thought he knew about her; and a pair of (mostly) loyal jhereg (the flying lizard variety). If Vlad survives this, he could always hang out a shingle as a private investigator!

Speaking of surviving, that’s what Vlad has to do in Dragon, which fills in one of the major gaps in his backstory. Taking place when he was still an assassin and a faithful member of the Jhereg, this book details the fateful events of the Battle of Baritt’s Tomb. In between brutal, action-packed sequences detailing the way of the war, we see how Vlad got himself mixed up in this little mess. It involves the dead Baritt, a room full of the soul-destroying Morganti weapons, and war between two very powerful Dragonlords, one of them Morrolan. In it, Sethra Lavode gets to indulge in one of her favorite pastimes: commanding armies.

Luckily, they’ll find a use for Vlad’s particular talents. Once again, it’s time to ask who benefits, and what the true goal is. Why the two mighty Dragonlords would go to war over a simple theft. Why certain people have to die. And what secret will ultimately be revealed. One of the seventeen Great Weapons is up for grabs, and the fight for it won’t be pretty.

Finally, we come back to the “present” in Issola. Having discharged his responsibilities in Orca, Vlad finds himself at peace in the wilderness, as many loose ends as possible tied up. So naturally it’s the perfect time for Morrolan’s ever-faithful servant, the Lady Teldra, to find Vlad and enlist his help. It seems Morrolan and Kiera have gone and gotten themselves kidnapped by the Jenoine, the very beings who, hundreds of thousands of years ago, were responsible for the very form and function of Easterners, and the various Houses of the Dragaerians themselves. In short, the sort of people who make the gods and demons go weak in the knees and look the other way. Any sane person would run like hell at this point. But Vlad Taltos, good guy and ex-assassin, isn’t that smart. He takes the job, and goes hunting for his missing friends, with Lady Teldra and Sethra Lavode to back him up.

Another small problem. Vlad gets caught as well. And the Jenoine want to hire him. This is even worse than the time the Demon Goddess Verra enlisted Vlad’s help, especially since … well … Verra’s the target. Let’s see. Kill Demon Goddess, or offend the Jenoine. Ever wish you’d stayed in bed? Vlad wishes he’d never even been -born- after that choice.

But even the gods can die. That’s the awful truth that lies in wait for Vlad and his friends as they rush towards a climatic confrontation between the Jenoine and the gods on the shores of the Sea of Amorphia, the mass of magical primal ooze which used to be Dragaera’s greatest city until the Great Disaster descended upon it. (For -that- story, see Brust’s The Phoenix Guards and Five Hundred Years Later, the first two books in a trilogy detailing the Empire centuries before the Taltos books take place.)

It’s a matter of gods, demons, things greater than gods, and a trio of Great Weapons, with Vlad and friends quite thoroughly mixed up in the middle. And someone’s not going home again when it’s all over. But the secret of Spellbreaker, long hinted at, will finally be revealed, and Vlad will be forced to reevaluate his life once more. Failure is not an option, if they want to keep the Jenoine from establishing a measure of power over the world once again….

What can I say about the Taltos books? Fast-paced, action-packed, and brilliantly constructed, each one has more layers than an onion, and more twists than a maze designed by a blind man on a drunk mule. The fight scenes are full of swash and buckle, both epic and gritty in extent, easy to visualize and fun to follow. The complexity of the plots and the mindbendingly convoluted nature of the stories make them a joy to try and unravel before Vlad does. It’s all quite sharp, and built on an epic scale. Brust certainly doesn’t think small, with stories unfolding over the course of years, and plans taking centuries to come to fruition.

The characters are resolutely over-the-top, mixing political treachery, swashbuckling adventure, and high magic, larger than life and twice as fun to watch in action. The majority of the books are told from the viewpoint of Vlad himself, and his sardonic, cynical, world-weary voice is engrossing, giving the books the perfect edge to keep them from being too full of themselves. In fact, it’s only when the books aren’t told from his point of view (such as in Athyra and parts of Orca) that the quality seems to slip and interest wanes.

The world Brust has created for the Taltos books is huge — a sweeping Empire, seventeen Great Houses, a history stretching back over hundreds of millennia, gods and beings greater than gods, and one mere human at the very center of it all. It’s fascinating, intriguing, and thoroughly delightful. Watching the pieces fall into place and the story unfold is a rare joy. It’s the plotting of a Dumas novel and the high adventure of an Errol Flynn movie, told with a voice that would make Humphrey Bogart proud. I highly recommend the Taltos series to anyone who appreciates their fantasy complex and multilayered, and above all else, fun.

You can read them in chronological order, or in publication order, or even in alphabetical order, but luckily, most of them are designed to be read on their own. I accidentally started with Taltos, so I knew how he met everyone and came to be before I read the rest of the series, but you’re free to choose your own order. With the first five books conveniently reprinted in two handsome trade paperbacks (The Book of Jhereg and The Book of Taltos) it’ll be easy to get started. The hard part may be tracking down the remaining books, but it’s worth it.

As an added curiosity, I picked up a copy of the graphic novel adapted from Jhereg, produced by Epic Comics back in 1990. It was adapted by Alan Zelenetz, with art by John Pierard, and it’s a very interesting, stylistic look at the world of Dragaera and the life of Vlad Taltos. I’m still of two minds about it, honestly. It’s not quite how I’d pictured the characters, but it’s still a good take on how they might look. Loiosh, Vlad’s jhereg familiar, comes off perfectly, and Vlad himself carries that unique mix of arrogance and cynical paranoia that makes him the gripping character that he is.

It really does boil down a complex book into too few pages, so that we lose the true complexity of the intricate plot that fuels the story’s progress. However, while some characters don’t look quite right, it does capture the little touches, such as the diminutive (for a Dragaerian) Aliera’s habit of levitating to make up for her height. And the exterior shot of Castle Black is simply gorgeous. Ultimately, though, I wouldn’t recommend it as the ideal adaptation for Jhereg. Too short, too quick, too simple, and it loses much of the beauty of Brust’s words.

That ends our tour of the Taltos books for now, but undoubtedly we’ll rejoin this world when Steven Brust chooses to add to the mythos.

The Bordertown Series (1986-1998)

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

Borderland, edited by Terri Windling and Mark Alan Arnold (Tor, 1986)
Bordertown, edited by Terri Windling and Mark Alan Arnold (Tor, 1986)
Life On The Border, edited by Terri Windling (Tor, 1991)
Finder, by Emma Bull (Tor, 1994)
Elsewhere, by Will Shetterly (Tor, 1991)
Nevernever, by Will Shetterly (Tor, 1993)
The Essential Bordertown, edited by Terri Windling and Dalia Sherman (Tor, 1998)

“Where Magic Meets Rock & Roll”

Once upon a time, in a far off land much like our own, there was magic. Then, one day, it was gone, and the world was a much drearier place for it. But we coped.

Then the magic returned, and the world was changed forever. Once again, the lands of Faerie bordered the lands of Man, and in the middle, there arose Bordertown, from the ashes of an unnamed mortal city. It was a place of magic, music, excitement, hope, dreams, energy, death, despair, hopelessness, nightmares, heroes and villains, men and monsters, and above all, people. A living, thriving town full of unpredictable wonders and untamable shadows. The bastard child of Haight-Ashbury and SoHo and Hollywood, the black sheep cousin of Underhill and Arcadia and Tir Na’Nog, the seductive and disreputable and scandalous older cousin your parents always told you to stay away from.

In short, the perfect place for runaways from both sides of the Curtain to run to. The only real place where humans and the Fae (the Trueblood) could interact on something resembling remote terms, Bordertown attracted all sorts of people. The starstruck, the dreamers, the hopeless and helpless, the runaways, those obsessed with the Fae, the predators. And that’s where it all begins … in Bordertown.

Back in the mid-80s, New American Library wanted a fantasy anthology series comparable to the then-popular Thieves World. They contracted editors Terri Windling and Mark Alan Arnold for the job, and didn’t realize until too late that they’d created a monster. They wanted Thieves World. They got the Summer of Love mixed with Thomas the Rhymer and some serious social issues for flavor.

Windling and Arnold brought in some of the best in the urban fantasy field to help them flesh out their new world. Ellen Kushner, Charles de Lint, Emma Bull, Will Shetterly, Midori Synder, Craig Shaw Gardner and more all contributed. Bellamy Bach, an author who contributed to several of the anthologies, was actually a pseudonym shared by a number of New York-based creative talents, and it has since been revealed that the true author of all Bordertown-related Bach stories (and only the Bordertown stories!) was Terri Windling herself. Later, with the third book,Life on the Border, the series moved from NAL to Tor, where they’ve been ever since. And while authors have come and gone, the true inspiration behind the series, Terri Windling, has remained a constant as editor and occasional author.

There are seven books in all: four anthologies, one solo book by Emma Bull, and two solo books by Will Shetterly. Together, they comprise the down-and-dirty, nitty-gritty, flight-of-fancy grunge-rock-punk ballad known as Bordertown. How can I describe it? It’s a stylized vision of New York in the ’80s, leather-and-lace big-hair bands, and the Wild West, all rolled into one. Youth gangs, runaways, flamboyant rock-and-roll bands, Elven court politics, people seeking their dreams … it was all there. You could find your heart, lose your soul, find your dreams, lose your way, and always come back to the beginning, in Bordertown.

Terri Windling’s essay on the creation and history of Bordertown goes into much more detail, so I’ll let her tell that story through the link below. Let’s get on to the books themselves.

Borderland was the first, the introduction to a world where elves and humans shared an uneasy peace in a city teeming with music, magic, and unpredictability. We soon realize that just because they live together, they don’t always like one another. Because of the nature of the city, magic and technology work equally poorly, often fizzling with dangerous results. For every hero, there’s someone to play the predator. And still, hope perseveres.

Stephen Boyett turns in “Prodigy,” a symbolic and literal introduction to the world of Bordertown. Six years after the Change, a mortal city remains chaotic, transformed and devastated by forces beyond mortal comprehension. Scooter, a musician and wanderer, provides a symbol of hope to those people who make their home in the city, giving them music and the magic of music.

Terri Windling, as Bellamy Bach, gives us a story of a more “modern-day” Bordertown, “many years after” the previous story. Evocative and dangerous, “Grey” is a mystery that starts with blood under the fingernails, and ends with a song and a farewell. In between, there’s excitement, personal growth, and a curse. What more can you ask for?

Charles de Lint gives us “Stick,” about a ferret-owning, Harley-riding enigmatic hero of few words, a John Wayne hermit-warrior who rescues a girl from a pack of Truebloods, and winds up with trouble of his own.

Finally, Ellen Kushner tells the story of “Charis,” a mortal girl fascinated by elves, who gets involved in a little romance and a lot of political intrigue.

Bordertown continues the saga. Emma Bull and Will Shetterly join the team in “Danceland,” introducing us to characters such as Tick-Tick, Orient, Wolfboy, and Caramel. Excitement, danger, and murder abound in the club called Danceland. Note these characters, as they’ll appear again in Shetterly and Bull’s solo novels.

Midori Snyder’s contribution is “Demon,” which fleshes out Dragontown, and a whole new host of dangers and thrills. Then you have “Exile,” by Bellamy Bach, and “Mockery,” by Bach and Ellen Kushner. Both are excellent tales as we’ve come to expect from such accomplished authors.

Life on the Border turns the volume to 11, cranking up the energy and enthusiasm as the authors really hit their groove. It’s like the song right before intermission, when the music’s clearly gotten into the blood, and everyone’s dancing.

Ellen Kushner contributes “Lost in the Mail I-IX,” a story split into nine parts, scattered between the rest of the stories in the collection, and written in the form of a series of letters sent home by a young runaway, who experiences the glory and despair that best represents Bordertown.

Will Shetterly gives us “Nevernever,” a story of the popular Wolfboy, Bordertown’s only full-time half-man half-wolf. Charles de Lint recounts the story of “Berlin,” while Midori Snyder tells “Alison Gross,” a spooky little story half-based on the ballad of the same name. Witj Kara Dalkey, Bellamy Bach, Emma Bull, Craig Shaw Gardner and Michael Korolenko all throwing in their own dreams and nightmares as well, this volume is one of the best of an outstanding series.

Elsewhere is the first full-length Bordertown book. Starring Ron, aka Wolfboy, it’s the story about how a confused teen ran away from the World (mortal, that is), braved the dangers of the Nevernever, and came to Bordertown. Before he’s done finding himself, he’ll find love and hate, love and death, sanctuary and oppression, and one of the best bookstores in existence, Elsewhere. Oh, and he’ll get a little curse slapped on him, making him Wolfboy, one of a kind in a city that thrives on the unique. From the residents of Castle Pup, to the hallucinatory and obsessed Wharf Rats (who drink the Mad River and are all a little nuts for it), Ron will meet a host of fascinating characters.

Nevernever is the sequel to Elsewhere, continuing Ron’s story and throwing him muzzle-first into more danger and excitement than you can shake a guitar at. Secrets revealed, mysteries explained, and oh, of course, music and dancing and energy in the air.

Finder is Emma Bull’s solo novel, and it picks up on her characters of Tick-Tick (an elf) and Orient (a human with the ability to find anyone, or anything … hence the name). When a cop named Sunny Rico hires Orient to find a killer, it draws them all into a web of drugs, conspiracy, and desperate survival. A plague that affects only Elvish-blooded people threatens the life of Tick-Tick, and it’s a race against time to pull the threads together and save the day. But not everyone will walk away in the end…. This is right up there withWar For The Oaks in terms of quality and ambition, using the urban-fantastical landscape of Bordertown to tell a story of love, hate, dreams, and obsession. Hard-boiled and heartbreaking, it’s worth the cover charge and more.

Finally, we come to The Essential Bordertown: A Traveller’s Guide to the Edge of Faerie, the last of the anthologies in the series, and definitely the show-stopping finale to the whole shebang. Some old friends are back for the final number, such as Charles de Lint, Ellen Kushner, and Midori Snyder. And look, they brought new friends, like Elizabeth Kushner, Steven Brust, Felicity Savage, Patricia McKillip, and more. With new co-editor Delia Sherman, Windling delivers something satisfying and invigorating. With faux guidebook articles about Bordertown interspersed between the stories, on subjects such as Elven Etiquette, The Music Scene, What To Eat, and How To Get There, it’s better than Fodor’s and more intriguing than Lonely Planet.

So what’s the appeal of Bordertown? It has many. It is by far one of the best shared universe collections out there. It’s a superb example of the potential held by urban fantasy. It contains work by some of the genre’s best writers. And it touches upon universal subjects such as the desire to find one’s real self, the need to stretch and explore and grow, the love of music … it resonates. Fifteen years after worlds collided and magic first met rock and roll, Bordertown is still going strong, having captured itself a place in our subconscious and never letting go.

In short, it’s damned good stuff. The only way to truly experience it is to go out there, and actually pick up a copy. While most of the books are hard to find,The Essential Bordertown is recent enough that you should be able to find a copy. The others may take work, but are definitely worth the effort. The settings and characters are rich and filled with complex depths; they are evocative, and just plain -neat-. Who wouldn’t want to visit Bordertown? It’s like Oz, except a lot grungier, much more dangerous, and with much better music.

Just watch yourself, and remember, it’s never as easy as it seems.

Three Brian Froud Books

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

Lady Cottington’s Pressed Fairy Book (With Terry Jones) (Turner Publishing, 1994)
Strange Stains and Mysterious Smells (With Terry Jones) (Simon and Schuster, 1996)
Good Faeries, Bad Faeries (With Terri Windling) (Simon and Schuster, 1998)

Brian Froud is one of those artists whose magical designs and whimsical creations stay with you long after you turn the page. Possibly best-known for his design work (with his wife, Wendy Froud) on cult-favorite movies Labyrinth and The Dark Crystal, he’s also released quite a few books of his own, both alone and with various collaborators. One of the best and earliest of these is simply entitled Faeries. I was going to review it, until I discovered it had somehow, somewhere along the way, suffered severe water damage and was in no shape to be read. (I weep for this misfortune, for the book truly is a work of art.) However, I do have three of Froud’s other offerings, which thoroughly show off his talent, his whimsy, and his skill at capturing the unknown which lurks all about us.

The first of these is Lady Cottington’s Pressed Fairy Book, written in conjunction with Terry Jones (of Monty Python fame, also the screenwriter for Labyrinth). It’s presented, tongue-in-cheek, as a pastiche of the Victorian fairy craze, purporting to be the true journal of one Angelica Cottington, who pioneered a unique method of capturing and recording fairies in her journal. To be blunt, she lured them in, and then SQUISH! between the pages, smooshed and dried like flowers. All together? Eeeeeww. Pressed fairies. This book details her sightings and capturings between 1895 and 1912, as she grows up during the changing, romanticized times of Victorian England. She could very well be the friend of the girls who so cleverly took photographs of fairies and convinced doubters such as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle that fairies were real. She was just more … hands-on.

Lady Cottington’s Pressed Fairy Journal possesses a wicked sense of humor, and never takes itself too seriously, even as we follow the development of Angelica Cottington through her writings. The text is presented in an ever-improving scrawl on both pages of this faux journal. Of course, the true attraction comes in the wonderfully gruesome images Froud presents, of fairies sprawled at awkward angles, smooshed and squished with a particularly surprised look on their faces. They range from flower sprites to mosquitoesque creatures, multicolored, winged, and preserved for posterity. They’re silly, serious, beautiful, ugly, and no two are alike, demonstrating Froud’s tremendous range of inspiration and capacity for invention. As a bonus, my book actually comes with its very own pressed fairy, suitable for use as a bookmark or window-hanging, or keeping pressed. This is one of those books that earns its keep just by being so bizarre, so very different from what you might expect. The last few pages are bound together with a strip of paper for our protection, as the last fairies in the book present some T&A in their own capricious, messy style.

Froud and Jones followed that book up with Strange Stains and Mysterious Smells, ostensibly written by the good Lady Cottington’s twin brother, Quentin. He goes a step further, to detail the lives and natures of another breed of fairy altogether, transcribing “The Unnatural History of Mess-Makers and Pong-Perpetrators.” In short, while his sister was smooshing fairies in the garden, Quentin was investigating the creatures that create odd stains, smells, messes, and so forth. Froud and Jones, entirely tongue-in-cheek on this one, purport to have found this journal, and to have recreated the unusual experiments contained within, to make manifest these creatures and record them for posterity.

Thus do we meet the Bule Ketty, which inhabits the fronts of shirts and looks particularly woebegone. Thus do we learn of Whooper the Soot, a northern stain which terrorizes kirtles and skilly-pans. Thus do we understand the nature of Mai Tee Pong, which explains the unique nastiness of “Floral Air Freshener.” Thus do we meet Lucy Lilo, the invisible stain that appears only after we’re convinced once and for all that our shirt is clean, right before that big event. Meet as well George Hackenbush the Fourth, Groucho Marx aficionado and strange stain. Beware of the sprite of joss-sticks, which has no name, but affects a rather politically incomprehensible demeanor. These are but a few of the dozens of creatures penned and sketched and painted for our edification in this terrifying, fascinating expose of the world around us.

To say that Jones and Froud are having fun here would be an understatement. The text is serious in that way that only great comedians can be, keeping a straight face while tossing off ludicrous situations and laughable names and silly anecdotes with aplomb and panache. Likewise, this is an art book, and Froud goes out of his way to truly embody and envision these creatures as they might be. The art defies description, and must truly be seen to be understood. It’s a unique style, all right. Where else will you find fairies picking their noses, inhabiting ATM machines, drooling or dripping mucus, or just insulting the reader? Strange Stains and Mysterious Smells is a unique book, and I thank my lucky stars it’s not Scratch-and-Sniff as well. This is easily one of Froud’s best works, with the artist at his most inventive and most evocative, and certainly his most disgusting in some places.

Finally, we have Froud’s followup to Faeries, a thick tome entitled Good Faeries, Bad Faeries, edited by Terri Windling. This absolutely gorgeous book is Froud’s exploration of the fairy world from two distinctly different angles, and is presented as a flip book. From one side, it’s all about the good faeries who inhabit this world and other worlds. From the other, it’s all about the bad faeries. So you can arrange the book to suit your mood or your tastes, and it’ll look right either way.

Starting with the Good Faeries, we are treated to an introduction by Froud, in which he explains how the book came to be, how he’s changed, grown, and learned much in the twenty years since Faeries originally came out. We see his more metaphysical side at work, a side which helped him to later create The Faeries Oracle.

The Good Faerie half contains a brilliant, well-written essay on the history and classification of faeries. He talks of naming them, of the elements they represent, of their unusual and expressive physiognomy, of the science of the faeries, of healing, and of communication, and so forth. To try and summarize would be a crime, as this could very well be a textbook on faeries. Hey, we know so little, who’s to say he’s not right?

Then we get into the actual faeries. There are the classic flower faeries, perceptive piskys, salamanders and sylphs and undines, The Faery Godmother, The Frog Queen, the knowing faery, the morning faery, and so many more. Dozens of gorgeous, flowing, fluid, natural creatures of primal passion and elemental magic, of legend and myth, folklore and New Age belief. Some have been around for centuries, some are as new as the book itself. There’s the ghost of a mushroom and the Plymouth Rock Faery, the Angel of Spiritual Empowerment and the Gladfly, the Healing Goddess and The Green Woman. There’s even the King of Green Men himself (our patron here at Green Man) and various pixies. They are too numerous and distinct to be described by mere words.

Froud’s artistic genius has matured and developed a lot over the decades. He’s not the same artist he was when he helped create the uniquely memorable characters and concepts in Labyrinth, but he’s changed only for the better.

Any one of the pieces in this half of the book could be poster-quality, easily. They’re that good, each one absolutely fitting the being it supposedly represents.

In the Bad Faeries half of the book, we run into the worst of an entirely different, very bad, lot. The introduction on this side is a mirror image of the other one, detailing another set of circumstances and beliefs to create one whole story. The essay for this part of the book details things like faery blights, defects, music, glamour, warding against the faeries, and more.

The Bad Faeries themselves are ugly, twisted, hideous, wicked, disturbing, creepy, and beautiful in their own way. There’s the Queen of the Bad Faeries, peering at us from between her twisted fingers. There’s a perfidious pook and a bigot bogey, the computer glitch and the sink faery, the dreaded Snagger (who preys on travellers and puts runs in stockings, among other crimes), and the faery of indecision. There’re the faeries of dark despair, the pang of regret, the compulsive faery. There’s even a faery for bad hair days!

These are all of the malicious, malevolent, mischievous, petty, nasty, evil, rotten things that go wrong in the world, taken from myth and legend and everyday life with equal glee. Morgana the Fey is here, as is the Out-of-the-Blue Faery (out of the blue, you remember that anniversary you forgot…) Worst of all is that fiend himself, the Buttered Toast Faery, who decides what side the toast lands on when you inevitably drop it. (There’s probably a Cat Hair Faery, which explains why they shed so much….)

If the rest of Froud’s books are good, this one is nothing short of superb in every regard, from the handsome design to the spectacular artwork inside. Froud is easily one of the best “faery artists” of this era, much like Arthur Rackham was for his generation, comparable only to someone like Charles Vess.

I can’t say enough nice things about this book. It’s a treat for mind and eyes alike.

Three Josepha Sherman Folklore Collections

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

Jewish American Folklore (August House, 1992)
Trickster Tales (August House, 1996)
Once Upon A Galaxy (August House, 1994)

I’ve known Josepha Sherman for over a decade now, ever since my high school days. I was originally attracted to her writing through the fantasy collaborations she did with Mercedes Lackey, and the welcoming, jovial nature of her newsgroup on the late, lamented Genie bulletin board services. Over the years, we’ve run into each other quite a few times at conventions, and as a result, I’ve put together a collection of statements that describe her.

She’s whimsical, with a puckish sense of humor, and a keen sense of the absurd. She’s a shameless huckster, who likes to lurk in waiting in the dealers’ rooms of conventions and bribe people into buying her books with promises of signatures and appreciation. She’s a splendid writer, a wonderful editor, and an accomplished folklorist, with a number of collections under her belt.

Gathered here, then, are a trio of her folklore collections, which demonstrate her range and versatility, as well as her specialties.

The first book is Jewish American Folklore, which was released as part of the American Folklore series, released by August House over a span of some years. For a poor non-Jewish boy like myself, this sort of book is really quite fascinating, giving me at least a little insight into the folklore and humor of the Jews. It starts off with several sections devoted to Lifecycles. The first details “Life and Celebrations,” going into some depth regarding the various holidays and celebrations, explaining the reasoning and methodology of everything from Rosh Hashanah to Passover, and including the Sabbath. Helpfully, there’s an essay on dietary laws, and what exactly keeping kosher entails, something that many people might not be fully aware of.

“Love and Marriage” comes next, exploring both engagement customs and the wedding ceremony itself. That, of course, leads into “Birth and Childhood,” which explains how exactly they go about naming the baby, and what circumcision entails from the religious and traditional standpoint. Then it talks in detail about the Bar/Bat Mitzvah. Finally, we come full circle to “Death and Mourning,” and the Jewish outlook on the afterlife (No Official Standpoint, basically). All in all, this is a very nice primer for those unfamiliar with Jewish customs or traditions beyond the very basic stereotypes.

The second part of the book is devoted to an even more engaging subject: “Folklore,” those wonder tales and moral stories and jokes that so sharply and clearly define a people. Many of them are pointedly obscure, or in-jokes that only someone familiar with Jewish lore and customs would get. They’re wry and subtly self-deprecating in the way a culture is when it pokes fun at itself. They reflect the strength of the people as a whole, and the pride they take in surviving. They possess that knowing irony and sly wink, and they are uniquely Jewish.

The first section is made up of “Wonder Tales,” or the closest things to traditional fairy tales Jews have. Many are familiar, to a point, picked up in centuries of wandering and adapted in turn, such as “A Jewish Cinderella” (which actually combines elements of a number of stories involving poor girls and princes and salt), and “The Snake Son” (which resembles “Beauty and the Beast,” and “The Frog Prince”).

Then we’re treated to a look at tales involving “Ghosts and Dybbuks,” focusing on the supernatural and the restless dead. In here, you’ll find stories of wandering spirits, the golem, those who’ve died without a proper burial. There’s an entire cycle devoted to the gilgul (or gilgl), in which a wandering spirit possesses the bodies of the living in order to fulfill one last task, or wrap up some unfinished business. In here, you’ll often find clever rabbis who save the day with their keen decisions and insights.

After that come tales of “Clever Folk and Survivors,” in which heroes and fools alike outwit the evil and greedy, and survive against the odds. These stories are representative of centuries of wandering and persecution. Here, we see examples of cleverness and cunning, the ability to say the right thing or make the right observation. Next come “Allegories and Moral Tales”, which impart measures of wisdom and try to teach in the process. For instance, there’re tales on living a proper life, the rewards of charity, and the importance of justice for everyone.

Finally comes my favorite section, “Humorous Tales.” All of those sly jokes and clever observations are here, from “It Could Always Be Worse,” to “Logic and Illogic,” from “Rogues and Tricky Fellows” to “Hershele” tales — Hershele being something of a legendary figure, the closest they have to a Jewish Trickster figure. There’re jokes about the Wise Men of Chelm, who are to Jewish folklore what Belgians are to the French, Irish to the English, or the president to Americans. We’re treated to a sampling of “Defiant Humor and Bitter Jests,” in which the Jews poke fun at their own lot in life. (So a Jewish man is drowning in a river, and two Czarist officers refuse to help him because he’s a Jew. With his last breath, he shouts ‘Death to the Czar!’ They promptly rescue him, and arrest him for treason.) The jokelore moves into the New World with jests adapted for American culture and assimilation, touches upon that stereotypical Jewish Mother, and finishes out with a look at the Jewish American Princess.

Following that are a selection of proverbs and riddles, some of which are truly mindboggling.

To round out the book, Josepha has added nearly forty pages of notes, going into details on folklore motifs, sources, references, explanations, and elaborations on some stories. This is true scholarly stuff, and another example of why she’s so good at what she does. After all that is a bibliography listing quite a few books.

This is perhaps an ideal sampler and introduction for anyone wanting to learn more about Jewish culture and folklore through its humor, tales, and customs.

Next up is a book that takes after my own heart. Trickster Tales is a collection of forty folk tales from around the world, focusing on the Trickster in all his/her many shapes and disguises. There’s everyone from Anansi to Tyl Eulenspiegel, Raven to Coyote, and of course Jack. These stories have been drawn from many different sources, representing African cultures, European fairy tales, Polynesian stories, North American Indian tales, and even Appalachian folklore.

What can I say? I love the Trickster. Whether he’s stealing fire, making time with someone else’s wife, dying and being reborn, playing pranks, spinning tales, or running afoul of his own foolishness, he’s a character I can identify with. He’s the Holy Fool, and the capricious hand of fate. He’s a whimsical figure, and an amoral presence who wreaks havoc in his wake.

He spotlights the foolish, pricks egos, robs the rich. Sometimes he reaps the benefits of his pranks, sometimes the curse. (In other words, some days you’re the windshield, some days you’re the bug.)

These stories spin a truly global perspective on the role of the Trickster in mythology and culture. Whether he’s an explanation for why things are, or a scapegoat, he’s universal. Josepha takes each of these multi-cultural tales and retells them with her own unique voice, keeping as much flavor from the original as possible, but still making them enjoyable and easy to understand.

The stories are accompanied by the whimsical illustrations of David Boston. If you enjoy folklore or, more specifically, Trickster Tales, this is definitely for you.

Now we come to Once Upon A Galaxy, in which Josepha plays Joseph Campbell for a new era. Her theory, one she bears out over the course of the book, is that a number of popular stories of today were inspired by stories of yesterday.

Thus, she can compare Star Trek to Jason and the Argonauts, Superman to Moses, Star Wars to Sir Percival, Bugs Bunny to Raven and Coyote and Spider, and The Lord of the Rings to King Arthur, or the quest for the Grail.

Mind you, those are only a few examples. Each section has five or six different stories attached to it, at least. She shows how the archetypes of Star Trek can be traced back to any number of wayfaring odysseys and journeying heroes. She looks at Superman in terms of the noble-yet-unknowing orphan who protects his adopted people, or as the abandoned child who is found and becomes a savior. In Star Wars, we see the archetype of the farm boy who becomes a hero. In Bugs Bunny we see every trickster figure you can name. In Lord of the Rings, we see such familiar elements as the Magic Ring, the Quest, the Unlikely Hero, the Wise Mentor.

As one might expect by now, Josepha accompanies her collection of tales from around the world with a truly comprehensive and in-depth section for notes, references, sources, and further elaboration on how each tale chosen relates to the “parent” story. Completists, folklore enthusiasts and scholars will undoubtedly be pleased with the scope of these notes and bibliography. To be even more helpful, there’s an extensive list of “Suggested Reading and Viewing” for those books or movies which draw upon folklore for their inspiration.

Any folklore collection from Josepha Sherman is well worth the price of admission, and I recommend all three of the above wholeheartedly as high quality and useful in their respective concentrations.

Wolf's Head, Wolf's Heart, by Jane Lindskold (Tor, 2002)

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

In Through Wolf’s Eyes, the first volume of a series by Jane Lindskold, the twin kingdoms of Bright Bay and Hawk Haven were thrown into upheaval, both political and otherwise, by the announcement that King Tedric of Hawk Haven was seeking an heir to his throne. Immediately, the jockeying for power and position began. Earl Kestrel, seeking influence for his own house, dispatched a mission across the Iron Mountains to seek out Tedric’s long-lost, disgraced son, Prince Bardon. What Kestrel and his men found instead, was Firekeeper. A strange feral girl of the right age to be Bardon’s own daughter, only survivor of the settlement Bardon and his followers set out to create. Raised by massive, intelligent wolves, as fierce and alien as any animal, Firekeeper returned to civilization, accompanied by one of the great Royal Wolves, known as Blind Seer. An outsider in human society, a stranger to politics, she proved capable of handling all problems. Even human treachery.

Ultimately, the line of succession was determined, though not without the brief incident known later as King Allister’s War. Tedric has appointed his heir: Lady Sapphire Shield. The throne of Bright Bay has passed to King Allister of the Pledge, himself a product of political maneuvering, while Bright Bay’s former ruler has been exiled to the nearby Isles as “reward” for her own treachery. Tedric’s heir, Sapphire, is engaged to marry Allister’s heir, Shad. One day in the future, Bright Bay and Hawk Haven will be reunited by this couple when they come into power. The neighboring kingdoms of Stonehold, Waterland, and New Kelvin look on nervously as the lines of power shift visibly. And on the Isles, Queen Valora plots revenge. Thus does the curtain rise for the second volume in the sequence: Wolf’s Head, Wolf’s Heart.

Firekeeper, also called Lady Blysse Norwood, a name she responds to begrudgingly, has more or less made a place for herself in society. She has friends, and allies, and a tenuous grasp of social custom beyond “don’t steal the bone while someone else is still eating it.” Blind Seer protects her, reminds her of her “true” nature. In her heart, Firekeeper is a wolf, desperately wanting to shed this human skin of hers for a fur pelt and real fangs and claws. She dislikes and distrusts the human scheming and manipulations that are a daily part of court life. But for the sake of new friends and adoptive family, she endures.

Then the plot thickens. When Queen Valora left Bright Bay, she took with her three magical artifacts, of a sort forbidden over a century ago. The sort of thing countries go to war over. She has them, and as long as she does, she possesses unknown power, enough to make everyone very, very nervous. But she doesn’t know how to use them. For that, she needs the scholars and experts of magic-loving New Kelvin. She also needs the scheming, dangerous Lady Malina Shield, the only person thought to study magic in either of the twin kingdoms. And so the threads tighten.

With an assassination attempt made on the occasion of Sapphire and Shad’s wedding, Firekeeper — not to mention everyone else — is on edge. To discover that Lady Malina and Queen Valora are working together and have taken the magical artifacts away, possibly to New Kelvin, worries everyone. And when Firekeeper is summoned home to an unheard-of gathering of Royal Beasts — those creatures larger, stronger, smarter than their normal brethren — she discovers she has a very important role to play. Firekeeper, the human with a wolf’s heart, has to find and recover the magical items, for the good of the world and her “people.”

Accompanied by Blind Seer and several of her closest friends — Derian Carter, Sir Jared Surcliffe, and Lady Elise Archer — Firekeeper mounts an expedition into the utterly alien land of New Kelvin, where magic is revered and the natives paint and tattoo themselves to announce their station in society. The mission: To steal back the artifacts. To find and capture Malina Shield. To foil whatever plots are in motion. To rescue Malina’s missing daughter, Citrine. To save society. It won’t be easy, but if anyone can do it, Firekeeper can.

Wolf’s Head, Wolf’s Heart is densely plotted, intricately presented, with levels and layers of planning thrown in three or four deep so that the story doesn’t stop unfolding until the very last page. Just because the political maneuvering for the throne is over with doesn’t mean it’s quiet for the residents of Bright Bay and Hawk Haven. In fact, the realization that this is intrigue on a grander scale, not quite global but certainly of the sort that precipitated the World Wars, is intriguing. Not only do we get looks at several of the other countries in that part of the world, we’re led to see how different they are from one another, despite their proximity to one another. Bright Bay and Hawk Haven shun and fear magic as a result of the Plague which originally cut them all off from the countries which founded them, while New Kelvin all but worships magic. Waterland practices an unusual form of slavery, and so on.

The characters are certainly fully fleshed out. Firekeeper is sufficiently complex; it’s impossible to think of her as anything but a wolf in human form, for all of her ability to function within society. She’s simply that alien, a product of her upbringing and socialization. To her, human society is strange and new, and the challenge is to relate it to wolven terms she can comprehend. Her friends all have their strengths and quirks, duties and obligations, unrequited loves and motivations. While Lady Malina would seem to be so nasty and self-motivated as to almost be over the top, it’s mainly because we almost never get into her head. We are, however, allowed into the thoughts of Waln Endbrook, agent of Queen Valora, and it’s certainly something to be said that despite his role, he’s actually quite likeable for his faults — up until a very certain point in the story, whereupon he does something so repugnantly, unasahamedly nasty, that the goodwill is spent in a heartbeat.

This is not a quick or easy story. One must concentrate to keep the political factions and various names in mind; things are convoluted, and sometimes it helps to go back and reread parts to see how a person might come to the point they do. But pay attention, and you’ll be rewarded. Do, and I mean this, read Through Wolf’s Eyes first. While this one stands on its own, it benefits greatly from a familiarity with the previous events. The summary provided above, and in our review of the book, are a pale shadow of the complex story presented.

Jane Lindskold just keeps getting better with each book. She’s one of those authors who truly seems to grasp and understand the alien nature of animals, especially coyotes and wolves. Even granting her wolves and other animals supernatural size and intelligence, she keeps them real and believable, which really goes a long way towards also making Firekeeper, the central character of the series, real and accessible. I am looking forward to the next in the series, for there will undoubtedly be at least one more, eagerly and without reservation. This will appeal to any number of fans: those who like fantasy or epic fantasy, those with more than a passing fondness for Tarzan or Mowgli (and for those may I reccomend Pat Murphy’s Wild Angel?), those who like political cunning and intrigue, and those who just enjoy a really good 600+ page read. Wolf’s Head, Wolf’s Heart overcomes almost all of the traditional pitfalls and limitations of being the second installment of a trilogy to present a thoroughly enjoyable adventure. I couldn’t predict how Firekeeper’s story will end, and right now, I wouldn’t want to. I’m having too much fun watching it play out.

Wizards, edited by Jennifer Schwamm Willis (Thunder's Mouth Press, 2001)

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

I’m of two minds regarding this interesting anthology. The first thought is that it really is quite lovely, and the editor does a splendid job of collecting the old and unusual for the lineup of “stories of mischief, magic, and mayhem.” The second thought is that it’s like eating an entire meal, but only half of each course. It’s enjoyable and delightful, but ultimately unfulfilling. Why’s that, you ask? It’s because, unlike most collections of this sort, Wizards primarily contains excerpts from older works. Not full stories, but a chapter here and a selection there. Of nineteen offerings, all of six have the beginning, middle, and end of a real story. The rest were taken from longer works.

The selections, as well, are somewhat on the esoteric side. The oldest of these are taken from the epic poems of Beowulf (translated by Seamus Heaney) and The Odyssey (translated by Allen Mandelbaum), with the former detailing Beowulf’s conversation with the dragon, and the latter telling of Odysseus versus the witch Circe. Already we’re off to an interesting start, pulling from such old sources.

Two selections from E. Nesbit, respectively from Five Children and It and The Book of Beasts, bring us closer to the modern day, drawing from what many might consider one of the best and classic writers for young adults in the Victorian era. The first describes how the five children in question disturbed a sand fairy, a Psammead, and gained a wish a day as a result, the first wish coming with unexpected consequences. The second story is one of the few complete tales in this anthology, and shows what happens when a disobedient boy becomes king and opens a book he really should not have, and does so several times. As Jennifer Willis states, Nesbit “wrote some of the world’s best stories about bored children looking for something to do and finding it.”

Certainly, the themes are unmissable, and they carry over to some of the other authors represented in the book, for instance, the selection from C. S. Lewis’ The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, in which the irrepressibly curious Lucy explores a curious old wardrobe and finds a magical land wreathed in eternal winter, ruled over by the dangerous White Queen. There’s a part from Philippa Pearce’s Tom’s Midnight Garden, where a young boy recovering from measles but suffering from insomnia discovers a world of ghosts, existing only in the hour when the clock strikes an impossible thirteen, late at night. And there’s a portion from George MacDonald’s At The Back of the North Wind, where young Diamond shares bizarre nocturnal adventures with the whimsical, capricious, shapeshifting North Wind herself. Willis even includes the beginning of Edward Eager’s Half Magic, a tale pointedly inspired by E. Nesbit, in which four children run afoul of a coin which can apparently grant wishes, but not entirely as one would expect.

Lewis Carroll is represented, with Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, reprinting the sequence in which poor Alice attends a surreal tea party, and comes away none the wiser and a whole lot more confused. Margery Williams’ charming story of The Velveteen Rabbit is included in full, telling the tale of a stuffed rabbit who, like Pinnochio, seeks to one day become Real.

Fairy tales get their due, with the entirety of The Snow Queen, as told by Hans Christian Anderson and adapted by Amy Ehrlich. It’s the story of two friends, and the lengths to which one is forced to go when the dreaded Snow Queen kidnaps the other, who’s been blinded in the eyes and heart by shards of the Devil’s mirror.

T. H. White has not one but two contributions. The first is a full story, “The Troll,” and the second recounts Wart’s first meeting with Merlyn in The Once and Future King. Meanwhile, Russian author Nicholai Gogol’s bizarre story of “The Nose” appears in full, but shoots itself in the foot by not only pointing out all the logical gaps, but going so far as to handwave them away as though they don’t matter. Why call attention to such things, if only to dismiss them?

Mark Helprin’s “A Jew of Persia” rounds out the selections from more mainstream authors, while the beginning pages of Roald Dahl’s The Witches, and the opening of Jane Yolen’s Wizard’s Hall finish off offerings from books aimed more at young readers. While there are similarities to be noticed between Wizard’s Hall (written in 1991) and Harry Potter, it would be impossible to mistake one for the other after more than a minute’s reading.

A selection from A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. LeGuin finishes off the straight fantasy selections.

What we have, then, is a diverse collection of excerpts and short stories, all featuring magic (although the piece from Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden is clearly figurative magic, not literal) and young protagonists (except for the few stories featuring adults instead). Therein lies the problem: this collection doesn’t seem to know what it wants to be. Is it all about young adults and children as protagonists? Not entirely. Is it all about real magic and fantasy? Not exactly. Is it representative of a specific time period? The Victorian era, more than any, but with ancient epic poetry and stories written within the past fifteen years, it’s not that either.

Frankly, I really did enjoy this anthology, but at the same time, an inability to label it frustrated me, and the fact that I’ll have to go hunting down another dozen books to find out how many of these stories continue and end also makes it more of a tease than a satisfying book should be. It’s a sampler, and a good one at that, but as a stand-alone it really didn’t hold up well. It’s great for pointing readers towards many other deserving books, but be warned that it doesn’t quite finish what it starts, in terms of what it offers. Decide for yourself whether this one is what you want, or whether you’re better off just seeking out the works of E. Nesbit, T. H. White, Philippa Pierce, Edward Eager, and all the rest on their own.

Wild Cards XVI: Deuces Down, edited by George R.R. Martin (iBooks, 2002)

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

Welcome back to the unpredictable, exciting world of the Wild Cards. After far too long a hiatus, George R.R. Martin has once again assembled a team of top-notch writers to tell some of the stories of a world where nothing is quite like it should be.

A quick primer for those who are new to the series, or who might need their memories jogged: In 1946, an alien virus was detonated over New York City. Thousands died instantly, thousands more were changed forever, and the world with them. Nearly sixty years later, the virus known as the Wild Card has struck every corner of the globe. For every hundred cases where the “card turns,” ninety die horrible, agonizing deaths, their bodies twisted and reshaped in unspeakable ways in what has become known as the Black Queen. Nine of those who survive the initial manifestation become Jokers, permanently disfigured and mutated, the world’s new most visible and least accepted minority. One out of every hundred survive intact, and are granted superhuman powers. These lucky few are the Aces. Of those Aces, only a few are gifted with the spectacular powers of a comic book hero. For many, the powers are trivial, minor, even inconsequential. Some are granted Joker appearances with Ace abilities. For these, they’re simply called Deuces. Got it? Good. There’ll be a quiz.

When the world thinks of Aces, they think of Golden Boy: unaging, invulnerable, superstrong. Or the Great and Powerful Turtle, the world’s most powerful telekinetic, so long as he uses his powers from within his trademark floating shell. Or Cap’n Trips, whose ingestion of certain chemicals transforms him into five other Aces, each inspired by a popular rock song. Or even Croyd Crenson, the Sleeper, who sleeps for weeks at a time, waking each time with a new and unpredictable power and appearance, sometimes an Ace, sometimes a Joker… For every Ace, there’s at least a handful of Deuces, and a greater number still of Jokers. The first fifteen books in the Wild Cards series (reviewed and summarized in Installment #23 of Peregrine’s Prerogative) have primarily dealt with the Aces and Jokers. Now, at long last, the Deuces have their day.

In Michael Cassut’s story, “Storming Space,” we learn the truth about the real first manned mission to the Moon, one achieved by a handful of Deuces and nats (natural humans) in secret. This builds upon his previous story in Book XIII, Card Sharks, which detailed how the first space program, utilizing Aces, collapsed through treachery and catastrophe. The space program in the Wild Cards universe has always been a little ahead of our own, ever since the alien Takisians came to Earth in 1946, and the hideous Swarm invaded in the ’70s. Now, though, we find out how things almost could have been a lot better, thanks to Cash Mitchell, whose power could replace the need for huge booster rockets.

John J. Miller brings us to the early days of a popular supporting character, Digger Downs. In his adulthood, he’s a pesky reporter for the tabloid “Aces” who seems to know just when someone’s got the Wild Card up his sleeve. In “Four Days in October” we see how he first discovered and honed his talent to literally smell Wild Cards. Assigned as a boy to cover the 1969 World Series between the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Baltimore Orioles, he becomes obsessed with discovering what hidden Ace is responsible for the Dodger’s astounding success this season. The answer will surprise everyone, hinging as it does upon a minor but profound change of destiny for a real world political figure. Digger will learn the value of a hidden Ace, explaining a lot about his behavior later on in life. (To say Digger is unpopular with the people he reports on is an understatement.)

Walton Simons explores a pair of Deuces working at a comedy club, in “Walking the Floor Over You.” What good is the power to make someone laugh? What use is the ability to become a protoplasmic puddle? And how will it help against giant ape attacks, or mobsters? In 1977, the Great New York City Blackout hid a lot of secrets… This story guest-stars the ever-popular Croyd Crenson, whose true Wild Card power, I’ve always sworn, is to be present for almost every major event in the series’ history. Also featuring the Great Ape, a Deuce whose power spun horribly out of control, once upon a time.

In another example of history taking strange turns, Melinda M. Snodgrass looks at a Hollywood where Grace Kelly never married Prince Rainier of Monaco. When she vanishes during the filming of The French Lieutenant’s Woman, only one man can crack the case: Joker-Deuce and everyone’s favorite centaur, Bradley Finn. Unraveling Hollywood backstabbing and politics, “A Face For The Cutting Room Floor” is unique among Wild Cards stories for also daring to tackle the ticklish issue of… Joker porn. Some days it desn’t pay to ask.

In Daniel Abraham’s “Father Henry’s Little Miracle,” a priest who can turn water into wine faces off against the deadly Demise, a man who came back from the dead out of sheer spite. At stake is a lot of money, and the life of a common prostitute. It’s just another day in Jokertown, especially for the poor priest, who’s really just filling in. This story takes place during Book Four, Aces Abroad, while the regular Jokertown priest, the beloved Father Squid, is touring the world.

Stephen Leigh picks up the story of a minor character from Book XV, Black Trump, a pilot with an affinity for fire whose involvement with the wrong people turns him into an international exile. The only place he’s safe is on Rathlin Island, which serves as a leper colony for the Jokers of Northern Island. There, a man who can’t go home again will find a home among people who have no home anywhere else. But will he be safe nonetheless? “Promises” is a love story with a tragic twist.

Finally, Kevin Andrew Murphy picks up in the modern day with a tale of Deuces in the spotlight. Swash, a Joker-Deuce with ink in his veins and pens for fingernails, is all in favor of his brother’s band, the Jokertown Boys, making their MTV debut at the newly-reopened Club Chaos. But things go awry when he’s dragged in to help a pretty girl find a very specific top hat. This story focuses on Topper, the Ace who can pull anything at all out of her grandfather’s top hat, and Cameo, who can channel a dead man’s Ace power, if she has the right personal effect. Guest-starring the fabulous Jokertown Boys, it’s a comic romp with surprises and Deuces galore in “With A Flourish And A Flair.”

Deuces Down is a change of pace for the Wild Cards series. The series had been growing progressively darker and bloodier, with main characters suffering, retiring, or dying left and right, and a worldwide conspiracy spelling certain doom and genocide for those touched by the virus. All in all, it was getting downright depressing. However, the stories in this volume seem to collectively aspire to more upbeat tones and endings. Sure, people die, people get hurt, but it’s not the unrelenting bleakness that had descended upon the world before. Maybe Deuces just live better, but in the majority of these stories, hope wins out and romance is at hand, making for a much more satisfying read in general. Perhaps the freedom to focus on these supporting and minor characters has helped inspire the authors to inject more optimism into the series. This is especially relieving, since in many ways this represents a new start for the Wild Cards books.

The bottom line is, Deuces Down is one of the best Wild Cards books in the series, certainly topping (or is that trumping) many of the later volumes in terms of story, quality, and sheer enjoyability. If we see some of these characters again, I won’t complain in the least. Certainly, the characters in Kevin Andrew Murphy’s story are all likable, brimming with potential and whimsy. They could most likely fuel an entire book on their own.

My only quibble with this book, and it’s a minor one, is that you must be able to suspend disbelief, enough to accept that even after fifty years worth of radical social change in the form of superheroes, supervillains, mutants, monsters, aliens and more, Britney Spears still becomes a pop star. Truly, there is no justice.

If you’ve ever enjoyed the Wild Cards series, but perhaps found the later books in the initial run to be a bit bleak, this book is the perfect reintroduction. If you’re a new fan, or have never tried the series before, you can start with this one easily. Though it does feature characters from other books, and pick up after earlier sequences, it stands on its own quite nicely. Inventive, imaginative, and innovative, Deuces Down truly represents the best of what the Wild Cards universe has to offer. Check it out today.

War For The Oaks trailer (directed by Will Shetterly, 1995)

Posted on July 20, 2010 by Michael M. Jones

“Eddi McCandry, the Seelie Court goes to war, and needs the presence of mortal blood to bring death to its enemies.”
–From War For The Oaks, The Phouka summing up why they need Eddi McCandry, unemployed musician-at-large.

In 1987, Emma Bull’s now-classic tale of urban fantasy, War For The Oaks, was published. In brief, it’s the story of a woman, her band, and the warring courts of Faerie, who seek Eddi’s aid in waging a war to see who’ll control Minneapolis for the foreseeable future. A full review of this novel may be found elsewhere on this site. What we’re concerned with is what came eight years later.

On her own, Emma Bull is a talented writer, songwriter, and musician. She’s earned fame and accolades for her stunningly beautiful and bold tales of fantasy and science fiction, and for her tenure in two musical endeavors, Minneapolis-based band Cats Laughing, and as one half of the duo the Flash Girls. On her own, she’s a force to be reckoned with.

She’s not always alone. Her husband, Will Shetterly, also is no slouch in the talent department, having seven books, numerous short stories, several comic books, and a handful of films under his belt. And let’s not forget that he once ran for Governor of Minnesota, and came in third. With such varied accomplishments to back him up, is it any wonder that he turned his theatrical visions towards his wife’s novel?

That’s right. Imagine, if you will, the movie version of War For The Oaks. Adapted directly from the book, and directed by Will Shetterly, with Emma Bull undoubtedly acting as a very close, very personal creative consultant. It was shot on location in Minneapolis, with a soundtrack provided by Cats Laughing, and the Flash Girls. When you consider how Hollywood traditionally and typically butchers adaptations, this must sound like some sort of blessing.

Alas, it has its downsides. For one thing, it’s only eleven minutes long, and is more a collection of brief “scenes” and images taken from the book than it is an actual trailer. But even eleven minutes is better than absolutely nothing, right?

Next problem. Unlike Mssrs Lucas, Spielberg, Tarantino, and Smith, Will Shetterly had almost no budget to play with. His solution was clever, and just a little indicative of the man’s warped genius. He recruited (heavily!) from friends, family, and the local SCA, and set about making his movie as best he could.

The end result is a marvelous look at what might have been. It’s like hearing a musical on tape, and then suddenly going to a dress rehearsal. It’s not perfect, it’s certainly not a finished product, and Bede knows it could use a lot of work, but it’s there. While watching this, you have two choices. You can laugh at the silly people in their SCA garb as they reenact battle scenes from the book, or snicker as a dog turns into a man with some clever camera usage. Or you can play along with the mood, and realize that if someone gave Shetterly a lot more money, a special effects crew, and some support, he could most likely turn out one heck of a product.

Forgive me if I wax overlong without actually getting to the point. War For The Oaks has long been one of my favorite books, and my finally getting hold of this trailer was cause to celebrate.

So let’s say you’ve read the book, and know the story. What’s good about the trailer? Well, for one thing, it’s painstakingly faithful to the book in word, and in spirit. You get to meet some of your old favorites, include Eddi herself, the Phouka, Stuart Kline, the Queen of the Seelie Court, Hairy Meg the brownie, and Willy Silver. Missing, however, are Carla (except for a few background shots), Dan, and Hedge. Present is a cast of dozens to represent both Courts of the Fey.

The trailer takes a wide variety of scenes from the book, and presents them in an almost random order, accompanied by a Cats Laughing soundtrack (“Here We Go Again,” “Nottamun Town”). Unfortunately, some of the scenes are decidedly spoilers, which makes this trailer something of a hazard for those who haven’t already read the book. Watch this, and you’ll know who Eddi falls in love with, what Willy Silver’s secret is, and a few other bits of important plot.

The casting is dead-on. Liza Johanneson as Eddi McCandry, and John Eric Bently as the Phouka, are darned near perfect matches for my mental pictures of the characters. In other words, I couldn’t have come much closer to picking perfect visual matches. John Eric Bently, in particular, delivers a cheerfully self-amused rendition of the Phouka. It almost makes me wonder if Bull knew these folks when she was writing the book… John Sjogren turns in an interesting performance as Willy Silver, though I must admit I pictured the character with shorter hair. Ah, details. While the translation of a book to a movie often leaves a lot to be desired, especially where character interpretations are concerned, we all have our pet peeves… I’ll be fair and not make any specific accusations. What matters here is that the actors fit the characters. Although the presence of Emma Bull as the Queen of the Seelie Court is somewhat disconcerting… but strangely appropriate. Maybe she is indeed one of the Fey.

How’s the acting? Interesting, in a word. The feeling I got while watching the trailer was one of a stage play being filmed. The actors are all very serious, and very into their work, delivering lines with enthusiasm, and the underlying attitude of “if I screw this up, Will’s going to lop my head off with a great big sword.”

Well, maybe not. But the truth is, the War For The Oaks trailer is a home movie, plain and simple. A darned good one, but it’s still a backyard movie filmed by Will Shetterly and starring everyone he could get his hands on. And that’s the beauty of it. This is a labor of love, folks. This was done because it could be. And I don’t mind telling you, I’d pay to see a full War For The Oaks movie done in this style. At least it’s faithful to the book. Any Hollywood moguls reading this, I beg you to contact Will Shetterly, and give him whatever he asks for. I’ll give you my sister as a down payment.

This is honestly one of those items that means next to nothing to the uninitiated, and certainly isn’t the best way to introduce someone to the book. It’s a curiosity, and a very interesting footnote. But if you like Emma Bull, or Will Shetterly, or War For The Oaks, this tape is a must-have. It’s a different way of looking at an already excellent story, and it speaks for itself. It’s well worth the effort. I promise you. And it beats your neighbor’s home movies of their trip to Mexico.

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: